Recording - May 2011 - 23

International House of Banjos gives you some crap about how state health laws don’t allow microphone returns, smile and go elsewhere. (It ain’t so, by the way.) In fact, that ought to be your policy for any microphone purchase. Before we get to examples, remember two things. First, don’t shy away from dynamic mics (or ribbons) just because condenser mics are more popular for vocals. Elvis often used an Electro-Voice RE15 (now sadly discontinued), as did Dolly Parton, and some great European rock records were made using Beyer M88s. Second, since I wrote the 1998 article, the Thunder Out Of China has changed the world—the explosion of Chinesesourced microphones at previously unheard-of prices. Sorry, but you won’t see a lot of Chinese mics mentioned in this article; there are far too many of them now for me to know which are good for vocals and which are not. The ones I do know and like (like the Groove Tubes 5sc) are long-discontinued. I’ll mention a few, though; you should check out other possibilities yourself, remembering the need for a dealer with a good return policy. We’ll start with a real smoothie, the Shure SM7B ($350). This dynamic mic is silky sweet when its frequency response is set to “Flat”, the top end has no presence rise, and rolls off gently in the top octave. If you have a singer with bad sibilance and nasal resonances, this mic could be just the ticket. Flip the switch, and you dial in a gentle presence peak without losing that sweet top octave. The SM7B’s output level is low even for a dynamic mic, so you’ll need a preamp with low noise and plenty of clean gain. Another dynamic mic with ambition is the Electro-Voice RE20 ($429). It’s the big whopper of a microphone you’ll see as the main announce mic in radio stations, and it’s the exception to my rule about mics in this category being very specific. The RE20 is E-V’s Swiss Army Mic; it doesn’t sound bad on anybody, and sounds pretty good on everybody. (And everything; it’s great for kick and bass cabinets, and I’ve used it on acoustic guitar and fiddle with success.) It’s unusual in that it has very little proximity effect; the tonal quality is the same whether the vocalist is near or far. The RE20 has a presence rise—not a jagged one, but a broad, smooth one which works well on vocals. The RE20’s kid brother, the RE16 ($290), can also produce really nice sounds on the right singer. Both, by the way, have unusually effective pop screens built in. I mentioned the Beyer M88 ($390) above. It has a sharper presence peak, again without sounding harsh; this makes it an excellent rock’n’roll vocal mic that cuts through a stack o’Marshalls admirably. It does well miking that stack, for that matter, and it’s also good on congas and other
RECORDING MAY 2011

percussion instruments. Not everyone likes this mic, but the people who do, really do. Note that I haven’t tried the retooled new M88 TG, so I can’t say how the sound is different. That brings me to another old favorite which got modernized, the Sennheiser MD 421. The original 421 had a sound close to the M88’s; a presence peak that never got harsh. Well, a few years ago Sennheiser brought out the MD 421MkII, and I’m sorry to report that I liked the old one better, at least for vocals; the new version is a little too spiky on top for my taste, though it’s good on guitar cabs. Fortunately, the original MD421 was extremely popular, and shows up regularly in the used market. Hey Sennheiser,

you could bring back the old design as a “Heritage” model and sell a whole bunch of them... just a thought. Another mic that’s been revised is a classic, the Beyer M260 ($390). This is a ribbon microphone, but unlike most ribbons it’s not bidirectional. Instead, the pickup pattern is a tight hypercardioid, which makes it useful for live work. The original mic is still my first go-to for women’s voices; something about the ribbon’s smoothness brings out a singer’s richness. The revised version keeps the basic sound, but introduces a bass rolloff to compensate for proximity effect (the M260, being a hyper, has a lot of that). It’s a mixed bag; the change makes the new version work better on men’s voices, but the extra proximity effect

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Recording - May 2011

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